June 17, 2007

Open Thread: 'Muslims In Space' Edition

"As Malaysia's space program prepares to send the country's first astronaut to the space station next year, it is confronting some of the standard first-astronaut questions: what scientific research to pursue, which local delicacy to bring aboard, and who among the eager candidates should go. It is also tackling some more unusual quandaries, such as when to conduct the five daily Islamic prayers on an orbiting ship where a day lasts only 90 minutes.

In April the Malaysian national space agency held a two-day conference, Islam and Life in Space, to address these issues. One of the star attractions was a computer program called Muslims in Space, which calculates when spacefaring Muslims should pray and, using spherical trigonometry, discerns the direction of the Ka'aba, the holy shrine in Mecca that Muslims face during prayer. To settle the timing question, the software divides the space station's 90-minute "days" into the same five periods used for prayer in conventional, ground-based Islam. The program then links these periods to standard Greenwich time, so the astronauts can pray at both the correct Earth time and the correct time of day that they perceive on the space station."

In other news, the administration is pushing for mandatory minimum sentences on "nearly all" federal crimes. No word yet on whether they plan to include a special exemption for Scooter Libby. Oregon's governor ordered the state's flags flown at half-mast in honor of Flag Day. And who knew there was an ice cream flavor called 'Staten Island Landfill'?

Open thread!

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Update: Forgot to add: the last two stories via Governing magazine's 13th Floor, which is a great blog if you happen to be interested in state and municipal government.

Comments

The program then links these periods to standard Greenwich time, so the astronauts can pray at both the correct Earth time and the correct time of day that they perceive on the space station."

Both?!

OK, I know this is probably rude and un-PC, but the first image that came to my mind was that poor astronaut hopping up and down off the prayer rug every 15 minutes in an accelarated worship reminiscent of Danny Kaye's instant-knighthood scene in "Court Jester."

I've got a paper around somewhere that I downloaded off some College Aerospace programs' website, that was an in-depth plan to put a Mosque on the moon, with some odd rotation mechanism to "point" towards Mecca.

This post reminds me that I never answered hilzoy's point "Frank: it's one thing to value martyrdom highly, and another to say, as what OCSteve quoted, "What is your most lofty aspiration? Death for the sake of Allah. What is your most lofty aspiration? Death for the sake of Allah." That's not, as far as I know, part of Islam generally."

On a previous thread. I've only started to study the Koran, but I don't entirely agree. Death in defense of Islam is the only sure road to heaven as far as I know, so it is argueably the best thing that could happen to you. Now I happen to think that is meant to let believers know that they shouldn't let fear stop them from serving Allah, but not that they should seek death and try to justify their deaths by saying 'It is for Allah.' I can imagine Muslims might feel differently though. Also I'm not sure if "aspiration" is exactly the right word, there may have been an imperfect translation there I feel.

To follow up on the flag thing, the story at the link says it was an accident that the governor ordered the flags at half-mast. (Half-mast would be for mourning, which is why I was originally puzzled -- it seemed like such an in-your-face political move for him to make.)

No, apparently he only meant to urge public buildings to FLY the flag, on Flag Day, to honor people serving in the military.

Hm. Probably just a busy p.r. person editing an old press release for re-use, but still...strange kerfuffle.

Britain joined the United States' invasion to oust the Taliban in 2001 because it feared America would "nuke the sh[!]t" out of Afghanistan, the former British ambassador to Washington reportedly told a television documentary to be screened Saturday.
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"Blair's real concern was that there would be quote unquote 'a knee-jerk reaction' by the Americans ... they would go thundering off and nuke the sh[!]t out of the place without thinking straight," Meyer reported told the documentary, according to the Mirror.

I read about that Muslims in space conference in New Scientist last year. It really goes to show how silly religious ritualism can be when you take it to its logical conclusion. There's a similar dilemma in Islam as to what people should do for Ramadan in the polar regions.

Stan LS -- I'm unclear on how your comment follows ugh's. From my reading, the point is not "blame America first," but that the Brits joined the war in Afghanistan in hopes of preventing overreaction, not because they thought the cause was just.

Aqua should be good. Yeah, BBall can take a while. The MOMA's pretty cool and there are interesting other things around that area as well, such as the Asian Art Museum (which I never saw but was played up as a big deal when I lived there).